A Separate Belief
by SexyPurpleBunnyRabbit
Summary: A Separate Belief, made over! GeneFinny slash. Finny survived. His surgery was a success. Well, as much of a success as it could be, which isn't much, considering he'll never walk on his two feet again. But that's not the point. He's back, he's alive...
1. Forgiven

_~*~_**GENE**_~*~_

"F-Finny," I stammered out his name. He glared, balancing all his weight on his good leg while he shifted the crutches under his armpits. "Phineas," I amended, "please, let me help you."

"You've helped enough," he grunted, pushing himself forward. His eyes sat like two, glowing emeralds atop his sallow cheeks. They sparkled with what looked like tears, but he looked away before I could be sure.

I swallowed around the lump in my throat and managed to choke out, "You shouldn't be up longer than you need to be. You're too weak-" His eyes turned onto me in an instant, and I knew I'd said the wrong thing.

"Whose fault is it Gene?! Whose fault is it that I'm stuck like this? _Crippled_!" The word stung my face, and I burned all over. I dropped to my knees, never too proud to beg. He threw his crutches down with such force that they bounced and skidded across the carpet. His face became shocked with a sudden white as he struggled to hold himself upright. He couldn't. He started to lower himself down, to save a little face, but even that was too much of an effort. He dropped onto the edge of his cot and it capsized, dropping him unceremoniously onto the floor. It was demeaning for him, I knew, but it would be worse if I helped. My desperate apologies rose like bile in my throat, but I swallowed them down and made myself look away. This moment seemed too personal. Even for me, his best friend. No, not that. What were we, now that I'd ruined his life, stolen all of his dreams?

"That's fitting," Finny croaked after few minutes, "down on your knees." My head whipped back to him, and I started to stand.

"No. Stay there." His voice had an edge to it that I didn't even know he was capable of.

The moon was a thick, white orb in the darkening sky and sleep massaged seductively at my temples, but I stayed there on my knees. Even when my thighs began to cramp and I suddenly got shin-splints, I didn't even shift to alleviate the discomfort.

Sometime during the night I gave in to sleep and now awoke with a start. A small quilt rolled off of my shoulders to the floor. I looked up just in time to see Phineas flop back onto his bed.

"Finny?" I chanced calling out his name, and prepared myself for the bitter reply.

"Go to bed, Gene," he yawned. "You're going to owe me big tomorrow." I couldn't help but smile, a slow, goofy looking thing that carried me through the night and into the morning. I was forgiven.


	2. A Little Walk

"Gene," I felt a strong hand push gently on my chest. I wrinkled my nose a bit as the faint scent of pinecones brushed my face. I peered up at Finny through one eye, the other scrunched up as if to make up for the one already open.

Finny's wide green eyes searched my face intently with an unnaturally serious frown. "Have you been doing drugs?" He asked slowly. I rubbed a hand across my face, pulling down my lopsided grin, which I hadn't even noticed, along with it.

"What're _you_ doing up this early?" I demanded, glancing outside through a solitary window at the back of the room. Mist still clung to the edge of the grounds, and the sun remained, trapped behind the morning clouds. I guessed it was any time from six to seven thirty. Finny's eyebrows rose a bit, as if he were surprised too.

"Couldn't sleep, so I decided you shouldn't either." He replied, pushing back golden curls which had plastered themselves to his forehead in the night. Even now, the air was thick with the summer's residual heat. He turned and started hobbling back to his bed, and I couldn't help but notice how the muscles flexed in his back as he breathed, the tan skin pulling taut against his shoulder blades.

I slowly pushed myself up, wondering how noticeably my own muscles flexed as I moved. My eyes flashed quickly to Finny, but he was busy picking at the plaster on his leg. His long fingers scratched incessantly, filling the awkward silence that settled around us.

I cleared my throat, "W-what do you want to do?" I couldn't help but trip over the words. What kind of activities could he manage with his leg all done up in white like that?

_What kind of activities could he _ever_ manage_? I caught myself wondering.

"Stop it," he sighed, and I pulled my eyes up to his.

"What? What did I do? I'm sorry!" My quick apology only brought a grimace to his face.

"Stop looking at me like that! Like I'm something to be pitied. Like…" His words trailed off into silence. He didn't need to finish.

_A cripple_. The silence hurt more than the word itself and I swallowed audibly. He buried his face into his blanket, and for a moment I thought he was crying, but he was only wiping sweat off of his face.

_Is he putting on a show,_ I wondered as the blanket moved to his moist chest, _Or am I thinking too much into this?_ I couldn't believe it as I heard my heavy breathing suddenly hitch, and Finny looked up, his big eyes growing huge.

"Gene, is that a-" I looked down, horrified, and yanked my pillow across my lap just as Brinker Hadley shoved his way into the room, opening our ears to the sudden commotion erupting in the hallway.

"Oh, man, Gene!" His face was both eager and worried. He started to walk over to Finny's bed, where he usually plopped down to drag on about some, more than likely, trivial matter. He stopped halfway when he saw Finny peering leisurely up at him, waiting for him to continue. Only I noticed the slight tightness at the corners of his perfect eyes. With no doubt in my mind, I knew he was thinking back to what he'd just seen, what I was now hiding under my pillow.

"And…_Finny_!" He struggled to hide the surprise on his face.

Finny, seeming rather amused, chuckled softly and asked, "Well? What happened?" Brinker stood awkwardly in the middle of the room, doing his best to divide his attention equally between the two of us.

"It's Leper! He's…well, he's totally lost it! There's a rumor going around that you," he nodded in Finny's direction, "died during surgery. Something about marrow in your blood, I'm not sure. Anyway, Leper's convinced that he's the cause and your dismembered body is haunting him. He tried to _kill himself_!" I threw a worried expression in Finny's direction, but his undivided attention was focused onto Brinker.

"Where is he now?!" He demanded, and I felt this familiar twisting in the pit of my stomach that only served to worry me more. Jealousy, a seething acid that burned me nearly completely through rose in the back of my throat, fully ready to take control of my words.

"That's just it!" He was almost giddy, "Nobody knows." His body shook with excitement. "You two wanna come help me and a couple of the guys look for him?"

As much as I wanted to leave, to put the earlier situation behind me, I didn't want to go. "No thanks." I mumbled, just as Finny replied, "Yeah, sure." I gave him a look that he didn't catch, forcing me to speak up.

"You sure about that Finny? The doctor said-"

"Forget the doctor, Gene." He grunted, leaning forward to grab a hold of his crutches. "A little walk never hurt anyone." I sighed, not wanting to get technical, and followed after them.


	3. Curiosity Killed the Cat

"I'm telling you, I heard something down there!" Brinker insisted, gesturing madly towards a small opening in a beaver dam at the edge of the lake. His eyes glowed with the heat of excitement as he bent down to rip up the collection of sticks and branches.

"It's just a beaver!" Finny panted. He leaned heavily on his crutches, his face flushed. Brinker remained oblivious to our words, grinning like a madman as the dam's debris piled behind him. Finny sat down in the shade of a tree, and I leaned up against the trunk. I couldn't help but glance down at him. He edged away, a slight grimace on his face. Sighing heavily, I moved to sit at the bank of the river, feeling ashamed.

_Why did that happen in the first place?_ I wondered, rolling a small pebble between my thumb and forefinger. _I mean, I'm not attracted to _men! _Not in the least. Sure, Finny is __extremely_ _handsome, but I don't see him_ that _way._

Sweat was tracing rivers in the salt that had dried on Brinker's forehead by the time anything ever happened, and it was just a young beaver poking its head out of the hole to see who was causing such a ruckus at the in its home.

"Margaret!" A familiar voice gasped, and Leper Lepillier stumbled out from the trees' underbrush. He crawled on all fours, scuttling over to the beaver who quickly ducked back into the dam.

From what I could see, Leper's palms were torn and muddy, yet he still dragged them across the coarse dirt. He truly looked mad as he wedged his head into the opening Brinker had made, his weedy shoulders unable to break through. "Margaret! Margaret! Don't leave me!"

"Leper, get outa there!" There was a slight spark of fear in Brinker's eyes, but it was instantly overpowered by his excitement and curiosity. He wrapped his arms around Leper's middle, and attempted to pull him out. After the first few tugs and Leper's constant begging to just leave him be, his efforts seemed futile. He planted his heels into the dirt, and leaned all of his weight into a final tug that sent him sprawling on his hearty bottom and Leper tumbling after him.

"Why'd you do that? Why'd you do that?!" The skin of his neck looked raw and tender, and I was sure more than a few of those welts were bleeding, but he swiveled his head around madly, throwing accusing looks at us all. That was, of course, until they rested on Finny. He looked like a god, reclining slowly in the shade of a tree.

_He's so…_ I swallowed around the word that had put a lump into my throat. His apple green eyes flicked towards me for a fleeting moment, and I glared. Everything about him seemed to mock me, from the glorious arch of his yellow brow to his pink, full lips that that curled up into a permanent smirk.

"Finny…Finny, Finny, Finny!" Leper smiled, as if greeting an old friend that he hadn't seen in forever. "What're _you_ doing alive? And with a head no less." He stumbled forward in a manner akin to a drunkard. He only took a few steps before his knees buckled under him and he returned to crawling again.

Phineas started to stand, and I took on a defensive position at his right. I recognized his frustration as he fumbled with the crutches that would just not sit right.

"You okay, Leper?" I spoke up, resisting the urge not to step back at the sight of him. The black of his eyes seemed to choke out all color yet for the thick yellow rings that should have been white. His nails were peeled back from the skin, the dried blood creating a brownish crust around his fingers. This wasn't the damage of just a couple days in the "wild". How long had he been marooned like this?

"_Okay_? I'm great!" He laughed a high little trill of a thing that teetered on the edge of madness.

"How long have you been living like this?"

He smiled, revealing a row of slimy looking yellow teeth with multiple chips. "Long enough, my friend. Long enough. I've started a whole new life out here." He stared up at the thin canopy of leaves, "That beauty Margaret was my…well, I guess you guys would call her my wife."

"Wife!" Brinker exclaimed, falling back into hysterics. "Good ol' Leper led the Tunisian campaign, bombed Ruhr, made an attempt on Hitler's life, and got himself a beaver for a wife!" He was gasping for breath when he sat up, realizing that he was the only one laughing.

"I did _what_?!" Leper frowned, leaning away from him with an utterly confused gaze.

I imagined myself in Leper's head, and could see Brinker's decapitated head bouncing about his shoulders, a crazy grin on his big face.

"We'll tell you later," I sighed, hoping I wouldn't have to. I didn't want to see Leper again. Not like this.

_Perhaps the next time we meet, he will have regained at least _some_ of his wit_. I could entertain this thought for as long as I liked, but I knew it would never be true. Leper was lost, and there was no bringing him back.

"We should head back up to the school," Brinker suggested, dusting off his muddied trousers. I stared at Leper's pockmarked face, and something told me this wasn't the best idea, but I didn't speak up.

**A/N: **_Ehhh…it wasn't that good I know, but the next one will be better, I promise! Please review or _something_ so I know that writing this story isn't completely pointless._

_Much love,_

_Amber_


	4. I Think We're Alone Now

"J-just let me put him back together. Please!" Leper grunted, large beads of sweat dewing up on his forehead as he threw his body against the cage I'd formed around him with my arms. There was no telling what he saw when he took in Finny's godly physique. A broken, mangled body that could only be hammered back together with a rock?

Beside Finny, a large chunk of bolder bore his blood, the crimson lacquer pooling into the shallow divots. I watched helplessly as he struggled to nurse his arm with an already blood-soaked shirt. Leper had torn a gash into his left arm that would undeniably need stitches.

"I can fix it!" Pleaded Leper, acting as if it was his own life we were trying to stop him from "saving".

Resisting the urge to wipe away the sweat that tickled my forehead I muttered, "There was nothing to fix, Leper! Just calm down!" Staring hopefully through the thinning trees, I counted every moment as the one Brinker would finally return with help in tow.

Suddenly, my captive went limp, and fell through my fingers. Just as I was about to ask if he was okay, he sprang up and lunged for Finny. He begged him to hold still, insisting he knew what he was doing. Finny threw his bandaged foot out into his path, sending him sprawling across the forest floor.

"Get 'em!" I gasped watching the scene before me as if it were a show and not something real.

"You _could_ help me out, here!" He growled, somehow managing to straddle the mad, raving thing beneath him. Despite the fact that Finny greatly outweighed Leper, he had a hard time staying on. Pulling myself back into awareness, I crawled on behind him and together we managed to restrain most of his movement. My heavy breathing filled the silence of our clearing, and I rested my head in the space just between Finny's shoulder blades. He arched his back away, barely even a hair, but I got the message. I leaned away from him, as far as I dared, and pretended to be as repulsed by him as he was by me.

To my surprise, he leaned with me and molded his back into the shape of my torso, his silken locks ticking my flared nostrils. There was no Leper beneath us, no Brinker just seconds away. It was just Finny and I. Alone.

**A/N:** Sorry it's so short, but I only have a short amount of time online. I'm supposed to be grounded, but I managed to get this in. It's only a filler chapter but I hope you like it!


	5. Accidentally On Purpose

"Gene," he bit my name out of the palpable hostility in the room.

"Yes Phineas?" I tried to give nothing away as I looked away from my French book. His brows furrowed in an unfamiliar way, and it took me a moment to realize he was thinking.

_Since when does Finny think before he speaks?_ It was an age old lesson he seemed determined to defy, and now he was struggling to place his words.

"B-back in the woods…nothing happened, right?" I stared at the boy before me, and he was no one I knew. The pleading look on his face compelled me to ask. _Who are you? The Phineas I know is never unsure of himself. Even when he's wrong he seems right._

"Do _you _think something happened?" I challenged. My aim had been nonchalant, but there was a slight edge to my voice that I simply couldn't keep off. He let out a heavy sigh, and flopped back onto his bed. Back to forgetting, pretending nothing ever happened. I stared at his bandaged leg. Out of nowhere, I suddenly wanted to scream.

_I __**love**__ you Phineas! I love you._ I literally gagged on the words. Swallowing the bile that had risen in my throat, I stood up.

"I have to go to the bathroom," I announced, as if he cared. He didn't even glance my way.

The chilled air of the bathroom usually raised bumps to my skin, but not today. Today I was hot, my insides burning with an insatiable fire. How could he dismiss this as nothing, with only a short shrug of the shoulders? I turned on the tap and let the icy water rush into the bowl of my fingers. I splashed it onto my skin and stared at the dripping face in the mirror. Was it really me? I imagined the beads of moisture curling off of my cheeks in thin, spiraling wisps of steam. It did nothing to quell the fire unfurling inside.

_How much damage could a punched mirror cause?_ I wondered silently. I had just settled on a plastic stall door when someone walked in. Crimson claimed the well rounded cheeks of Chet Douglas, and he took a couple retreating steps.

"Hey, Gene."

"Chet," we nodded in acknowledgement, "what's up?"

"I was, uh…" His glance flickered toward a urinal and he grew darker. He jammed his hands into his pockets and stammered out, "Do you think you could…uh, I dunno…_leave_?" I felt my own embarrassment claim its territory, all the way down to my collarbone.

Raking my fingers through my hair, I nodded quickly and scuttled out of the room. Brinker obviously wasn't keeping his mouth shut. Maybe even tagging on a few more "details".

_Why should __**you**__ be ashamed?_ A voice inside my head demanded. _It was Finny's fault. _Against my better judgment, I recalled our time in the woods.

_Finny's mouth was so close to mine, I could taste the sweetness of his breath as it moistened my lips. We weren't worried about Leper, and the fact that he had gone limp beneath us, or the fading light of the afternoon. I tried to whisper his name, to ask what he was doing, but butterflies had crowded my throat and I couldn't form my tongue around a single word. It didn't matter of course, because he'd already captured my lower lip with his teeth and worked it slowly with his own._

_**Clearly**__, I thought, __**he knows what he's doing.**__ My insides were on fire. The first time I'd ever kissed someone had been when I was about ten, and it shouldn't really count considering it was my cousin. But back then we didn't realize how inappropriate that was. __**Any appropriate thoughts I'd had about Phineas now deserted me. **__I sealed my lips against his, deciding I would get as much out of this as I could. I wrapped my fingers around the back of his neck, and somehow worked up the confidence to break apart his lips with my tongue._

_A twig snapped, only a few feet away, and long moan froze in my throat._

_"What was __**that**__?" Finny was implying the sound of the snapped twig, but Brinker, only feet away, most likely thought I was stealing kisses in the middle of the forest, and Finny was a helpless victim of my perverted antics._

_Dr. Stanpole coughed into his fist, trying to pretend he hadn't seen what he clearly had._

_"Is Leper okay?!" Brinker demanded, and I finally looked down upon his unconscious face. We slowly crawled off of him, taking care not to touch each other more than necessary. We couldn't meet the other's gaze as Dr. Stanpole poked and prodded Leper, testing his pulse, looking under his eyelids, and other things I couldn't guess a reason for._

_"He should be fine. Just passed out," he muttered in an apathetic tone, raising himself up and dusting off his trousers. "Can I ask you two boys why on earth you were ki-…sitting on this young man?" His façade wavered only slightly. My head hung, as if unhinged, between my shoulders._

_"He was pretty lively when we wrestled him down earlier," Finny sighed, not seeming to be embarrassed._

_"I see, well…why don't we carry 'em back to the infirmary, yes?" I could still taste Finny, inside my mouth, and it made my entire shake._

_Dr. Stanpole, misreading my body language, quietly assured me, "He's __**not**__ dead."_

_**Dead?**__ The thought had crossed my mind not once, but now I stared at the boy in my arms and imagined that I was the one who had slowly squeezed every inch of life out of him. The others stared too._

The progression towards my dorm was harder now that I was taking in my surroundings. They were all giving me a wide berth, glancing away as they whispered scandalous rumors behind their fingers.

_Like a bunch of girls_, I thought to myself, ducking into the nearest room. Ironically enough, it was the infirmary, and I found myself caught against the wall.

"Hello, dear," an elderly woman stopped at my side, "can a help you?" Her milky eyes looked me over, for some sort of damage.

"Uh…is Leper here?" The woman frowned. "Or…uh, Elwin Lepillier?" I hadn't used his real name in so long I'd almost forgotten it. She lifted a clipboard off of the wall beside me and deftly thumbed the pages. She stared at it a moment, as if she'd forgotten how to read. I craned my neck slightly to see the paper, but she hugged it to her chest.

"You're friend has been sent home." She said it mach too quickly, but her thin lips cracked in a smile that was marred by so many wrinkles I couldn't tell whether it was false or not. "You should be headed back to your room now. We're very busy in here." I nodded shortly, gazing across the empty room, and forced myself out into the hallway. In that short moment the halls had become barren, and raced away before that could change.

That night I found myself silently wondering what had really happened to my old friend. He certainly hadn't gone home.

**A/N:** _I think this is the longest post yet! Good. That was my intention. I'm at a loss for some new ideas…I somehow managed to turn it into some controversy with Leper...which I didn't want at all!!! I feel that it has started to pall as well, so if any of my slowly diminishing readers (hinthint rate and message—get what you want) have some ideas, tell me! I'm more open minded than you think. Just don't expect any sex…well, no _details_ anyway. I feel takes away._

_Anyway! I'll let you go_

_--Your sexy purple bunny rabbit, Amber_

_(Don't ask me where I got that from)_


	6. Only Stairs

"Now everybody, get into partners and we can begin the project." Mr. Lawler's deep rasp of a voice evaporated into the din of the classroom as boys raced to get a good partner and join friends, though Finny and I needn't do that. Every group project we'd ever had was shared together, and it hadn't occurred to me that this would be any different.

"Listen, Finny…I know we've been sort of _on the rocks_, but…" My voice trailed off as I stared into the empty seat beside me. Finny was already halfway across the room, laughing it up with a few guys that were once my friends as well. Heat rose to my face, an unsettling mixture of anger, embarrassment, and what had grown to become one of the worst emotions I'd ever known. _Jealousy_.

I fought away the memories that begged for attention, pushing their way to the front of my mind. I could only keep them at bay for now, enveloping my head into my arms.

"Mr. Forrester, I take it you're not working with Phineas?" Mr. Lawler approached my desk.

I pushed my head up from my table, "I guess not. Is there someone else who doesn't have a partner?" I tried not to sound too pathetic as I frowned up at my history teacher.

The thick, leeches for eyebrows arching over his beady eyes knitted together into a single braid as he replied, "Actually, there aren't any…" He took note of my poorly disguised disappointment and quickly added, "Lucky you, getting to work all alone. Now you don't have to depend on someone else for a portion of the work." My mood shifted instantly from disappointment to annoyance, and he sealed his lips together. As he wove his way back to the front of the room, Finny plopped back down beside me.

"Hey Gene," he breathed nonchalantly, pilling up his loose papers in the middle of his desk. "Who are you working with?" Banging my text book open and flipping furiously through the pages, I chose not to reply. The simple fact that he could remain calm while my own anger flared only made the situation worse. Taking a moment, I mustered my darkest glare, but it was only the thin air that I assaulted now. Finny was making his way back towards his _friends_. Had he even waited to hear my reply?

I watched silently as he balanced his papers atop his head and sashayed down the narrow aisles created by the desks in a comedic manner, showing off for the other guys. The entire classroom had migrated to the other half of the room, eager to take in his perfection and glow under his attention. I wanted to be them. To be free, unhindered by the memory of his lips against mine. And his rejection.

After class, I would have loved to just go up to my room and relax, to put this day behind me, but that would mean having to pretend I didn't notice Finny, that he wasn't there, despite the fact that every part of my body was in tune with his. Even the less unfortunate parts.

Instead, I found myself staring down at the cold grey steps that led up to the chapel. I knew what had brought me here, but I convinced myself it was only a coincidence. That I'd showed up at what could have been Finny's demise by pure chance. I had traveled across these countless Sundays, but it was only now that I stopped to look at them and contemplated what they were capable of.

**Pain…torture…**_**murder**_

But I had to remind myself, _They're only stairs._


	7. The Walk of Shame

Digging my heels into the too soft soil of the field, a result of the overworked sprinklers, I stomped my way up to the school. My balled fists, tight in the shallow pockets of my school uniform, throbbed against my thighs, my jaw twitching under the skin.

"Hey, Gene! Come over here!" About a hundred feet away, an unfamiliar student with short black hair and a cocky grin waved me over. A leather clad ball was stuffed under his arm and I recognized the organized chaos spilling over the far corner of the field.

"What do you want?" I called back, planting my feet into the soupy, brown grass. My arms were folded across my chest, defiant, but I could help but feel a flutter of hope flowering in my chest.

_This is my chance,_ I thought_, this is my opportunity to break away from Finny and his crowd. It's about time I made some new friends…_

He glanced over his shoulder and exchanged a look that I couldn't make out, with the guy behind him.

"We're down one man for a game of blitzen ball. Why don't you join us?" His cracked lips curled up again, arrogant as ever, and I was eager to wipe it off. Unfolding my arms, I began to move towards their group.

I should have known. I should have known.

I could feel it, the heat, bubbling up over my collar bone, pushing into my face, flushing it. Burning. My lips curled in a hideous grimace and fierce tears that I didn't even care to wipe away sizzled down my cheeks. I couldn't think of a single eye that didn't follow me as I blazed down the hallway, hell bent.

"_Phineas_." The word came out a slow hiss that nearly raised blisters on my tongue. My body shook, fists clenching and unclenching. The door flew open, shut behind me. There he was, his godly physique, sprawled across the unworthy floor. A long white towel tucked at his waist, another working at his perfect ringlets of gold. I hated it. Him. I hated him. "Get up. _Now_." I didn't wait. Short as my nails were, they bit into his wet arm and I dragged him out into the hallway.

"Gene, what are you doing?! Stop! Stop it n-"

"_Tell them_!" The words grated out of my throat, ripping up my throat in two angry words. "Tell them who kissed who, who deserves to be shunned. Tell them who deserves to get kicked around and punched in the face with a goddamn soccer ball!" He turned to face me, his hand tightening at the top of his towel as he took in my split lip and swollen eye, the long gash that ran along my chin.

"Me," he choked out, barely above a whisper. There was no mistaking the sparkle, the diamonds that glinted at the edges of his eyes. "Me."

I wanted to challenge him, make him speak louder. Let them all to hear the truth. But not even _he_ wasn't listening. He was inching down the hallway, trying to look dignified as he clutched a towel at his waist and limped away in the cast _I _forced him into.

_Such a terrible ritual, the walk of shame_.


	8. Making Amends

The water was red, like fresh blood carrying across the foam-crusted waves, gushing out from the feeble looking sun. I thought of Finny, how weak _he _had been, and how I still tried to break him, take away what little he had left when I didn't "finish the job" in the tree. Was that what best friends were for? Ruining lives? Oh, I felt _horrible_! Like I could sink beneath one of those bloody waves and just disappear. But I cupped it in my fingers instead, cradled the salty mixture in my palms, and it was the clearest thing I'd ever seen.

The sun was playing more tricks, making me see what wasn't truly there.

_Like Finny?_ I thought of his grassy eyes, flaxen hair yellow as the…sun. How often had I been fooled by its blinding light, let it dazzle me? Was my former ally only putting on a show to elicit regret, shame?

I looked back to the sky; the golden haze sinking beneath the watery abyss, squelching its flame. I didn't want it to go though, I missed it, _craved_ it, and it was slipping through my fingers. The curve of the sun, a perfect golden arch that was reminiscent of something. _Something_.

It was the peach of Finny's flesh, highlighted by a flourishing rose just below the glittering surface. Would it melt on my tongue like some forbidden fruit, sizzle at the back of my throat like an exotic spice? I had to know. Burrowing my toes in to the loose, ocean floor, I kicked off into the blood-red water.

"Gene!" I only barely heard my name stretching out from across the shore. "_Gene_!" I coughed, gasping around a short, green wave that had jumped into my face. I could barely make out Finny's form through the rivers of water that dripped from my lashes. He waved me over in an exaggerated swing of the arms, head tipping back in the effort. I paddled back to shore, crawling when the waves nudged at my knees.

"What're you doing here?" I gasped, combing back the curls that had sealed themselves to my forehead and cheeks as I stretched out along the shore. "_How_ did you get here?"

"One of the guys…" He shrugged, tracing patterns in the sand with his good toe. "I wanted to…to…" He growled under his breath, lowering himself down beside me. "I don't even know. What happened, Gene?"

I pushed myself up onto my elbows, ignoring the sand that had caked itself to my wet skin. "Nothing you should be sorry for. I'm really to blame-"

"You don't need to apologize," Finny insisted, eyes pinching together and lips puckering. He tucked his hands beneath his head, tilting his chin up to give me an empty smile, his once bejeweled eyes dull. "It's my fault, anyway. I should have...explained what happened, or something." Folding his torso over the crook of his knees, he played silently with his fingers and continued, "Forgive me?" The words came out in a slow, drawn out whisper, as if he was tasting the words, tongue wrapping around each syllable. How foreign they must have been in his sweet mouth.

I tried to pretend that the guilt wasn't tearing away at my insides, tying my stomach in knots and pushing bile up my throat. Why wouldn't he just let _me_ do the apologizing?

"Of course I do! There's nothing to forgive, but _I_-"

"Had every right!" He interjected, springing to his feet, momentarily forgetting his bandaged limb. He stumbled forward a bit before flopping back down into the fluffed up sand, which clung like bees and honey to his browning cast. "I really can't stand you trying to apologize, Gene. I knew what I was doing."

That one hurt. Silently I'd hoped that he didn't know how greatly his actions had affected me, that he wouldn't have done it if he understood. But then again, Finny always could read me the best. I traced swirls in the mud of my thighs, rolling the coarse mixture between the pads of my thumb and forefinger. How do you reply to that?

I flicked the dirt from my hands, "I don't blame you. I deserved everything I got." My tongue ran absently across the scab that had been thickening atop my lower lip.

The action did not go unnoticed by Finny, who flinched as he forced his eyes back to his interlaced fingers. "W-what happened? With those guys, you know?" His straight, white teeth clicked together, jaw forming a circular bulge beneath his ear.

"Nothing important," I shrugged weakly. "Just a bunch of nitwits who didn't know how to play blitzen ball." Smiling a bit, I figured it would be safe to give him a little nudge of the elbow. _He_ didn't smile.

"I figured I was at least still good enough for the truth, Gene." I didn't recognize the expression he wore: Emerald eyes flashing in the dwindling sun, sculpted features pinching together at the middle of his face.

I swallowed, "Of course! It was just a...I mean..."

_Hurt._ That was the emotion that soured his features. The impossibly oblivious Phineas had been hurt. Never had such vulnerability been so attractive.

_I could steal a kiss_, I thought eagerly, gazing upon his momentary innocence, _right here, and none but Finny and I would be the wiser._ My entire mouth burned with the memory of his.

"Well..." I fought down my desire with a nervous chuckle.

"_Well_?"

"We were actually getting along okay until I completely tackled this one guy, the ring leader I suppose."

_"Get off me, you _faggot_!" I'd been wrestling the ball out of the brunette's tiring hands, arms constricting around his middle when that word stilled my breathing, constricted my lungs._

Faggot? Is that what I am then? _I brought my knee up and jammed it into his back, smiling as I received an anguished groan._

_"Hey!" As I struggled to untangle my legs and arms, I glanced around to see that the other boys had gathered around to witness the tussle, and now sprang to their leader's defense._

_"You can't do that!"_

_"Yeah, it's against the rules!" They all cried out in sporadic, pathetic little whines, demanding an apology they wouldn't receive._

_Heels back in the disintegrating field, I easily replied, "There _aren't _any rules. You do whatever it takes to win." Thoughts wandering back to the one who had created the game, I could help but let bitterness drip into my words. I shook my head in a failed attempt to clear my thoughts, moving towards the school._

_A strong hand tightening on my shoulder forced me back around. I stared back at a tight-lipped boy with weak blue eyes and springy red curls glared down at me. He quipped out, "You owe my friend an apology, Forrester."_

_Chin pushed up and chest thrust forward I responded, "I don't owe _you_, or any of your other idiot friends an apology." It was my erect finger kneading into his chest that emphasized the otherwise weak words._

"Were you _crazy_?!" Finny demanded, fingers tightening around a clump of sand. "You must have been, because I've seen you fight and it's not so-"

"Phineas, please!" I couldn't help but laugh, the skin around my scab pulling apart. Licking up loose beads of blood, I forced myself to continue the story.

"_I think you do." Iron fist clutching at my arm, he forced me into a pile of mud, foot poised and ready to strike at my ribs. It made forceful contact when I tried to raise myself up onto an elbow, hoping the anger searing through my eyes would let him know wasn't in the mood to "play". I looked up from my tortured position and saw that he wasn't either._

"_Fine," I coughed weakly, "I'm s-s…" My teeth gritted together. Why couldn't I get those words out?_

"_Forget the apology," the brunette growled, arching his back a bit as he moved to join his friend. "I wanna see a faggot cry."_

Eyes traveling back to Finny, I wished I had omitted that last part. His teeth worked slowly at the corner of his mouth, brows pulled together in a horrified grimace. "Did he really say that? Did you cry?" Silence was his only answer, for he already knew.

I recalled the feel of those acid tears that had burned my face, leaving behind the mark of my shame.

A/N: One day early! I'm not sure if it's the best, though. This is the result of a random thought at six in the morning with a bit of help from Jean Kitsune and the careful urgings of Pauline… It's long at least! sigh I want HONEST opinions! Like…I don't wanna hear it unless you have something bad to say!

Alright, not that exactly but you get my point.


	9. Solitude

"Mmmh…Finny," I gave a long moan, coarse sand grating at the back of my throat. "Finny?" My fingers tightened around upturned clumps of mud and grass. I gazed through the eerie green haze that filtered through the canopy of leaves reaching out above me. The air, thick with moisture from yesterday's rain now saturated my lungs, weighing down every breath.

I found myself up on the balls of my feet, every part of my war-weary body protesting the action. Every part aching, begging me to just give up, stop trying.

I slowly remembered where I was, that there was no Finny. There was only this small pack of the bare necessities and the few other men left over from my battalion. Where were they?

Just behind me was a thin wall of trees and creepers that offered glimpses of a foot worn path in tiny, secluded pieces, but I didn't want to go. I brought myself back down onto my haunches with a defeated sigh. You could only live on false hope for so long.

My hand rummaged around inside the breast of my mud stained coat, pulling out a thin bundle of letters from home, and plucked one out from the middle. It was falling apart at the creases, edges nearly rubbed through. I gazed hungrily at it, waiting to be reminded of the courage that had brought me here in the first place, but the words were rubbed too deeply into the parchment, disappearing into pale, grey smudges. I grabbed another, but here the words were long black tears dragged down by the moisture of my own eyes.

What could I possibly manage without those words? From my mother, father…Finny? What did I have to fight for now? What did I have? I touched the crumbling pages again, pressed them to my nose, but the smell of home was gone: washed away by rain and tears.

I stared at the inside of my lids, the only thing familiar in this horribly confusing place. I wanted a pair of arms to remind me that I wasn't alone, a warm voice to fight this chill that threatened its way up my spine. But all I had was me, and my own arms were too tired to move, voice too weak to rise above a whisper. That is what I had left.

_Why am I here?_ How is it that even the voice of the mind manages to quiver with fear, stained only with the reassurance of pain? _I-I should be home…I'm only a boy. I'm only a boy!_

I thought back to that defining moment when Brinker passed off that pen to me, when I pushed the tip in so hard the ink bled through the page.

"_We're men now. Men."_

I could still feel that place on my left shoulder where his hand had stung my back, when I swallowed the pain and blinked back the water in my eyes. I didn't _feel_ like a man.

I coughed again, gasping on the dirt that still stung the back of my throat and pushed my eyes back open. I couldn't even get comfortable while I waited to _die_! I pounded my fists into the beach sand that simply wouldn't lie flat; surprised as I felt the fine dust sticking to my wet cheeks. I scraped it away, stomping my way to the shore. It wasn't until the icy, grey waters crashed against my ankles that realization came to me.

This wasn't some body-strewn beach at the shore of Normandy, this was _my _beach. Finny's! Ours! I wasn't staring into some cold black soil, waiting for the darkness to signal my end.

I stared across the endless swell of water to the dead, blue-grey of the sky. Where was the sun?

It started as a tentative blush, a perfect rose unfurling at the line where the earth seemed to end. It was delicate and self-conscious as it peeked over the edge of water, the gentlest strip of violet urging it on, pulsing above an impatient, bold red. The sweetest slips of honey worked themselves into the equation, the only color purposeful enough to fight its way out of the confusion, claim its place. It was this beauty right here that had people whispering of cities of gold, oceans that were really wines. And yet, the sun wasn't deceptive. People saw what they want to see, and made of it what they wished, but that didn't mean the sun was here to trick and deceive. It offered us something beautiful…golden. Perfect.

I glanced back at Finny, an eager grin settling along my mouth as I waited to see his reaction to such a novelty. But there was only his snores punctuating the air, adding its own part to this special symphony that only a few got to hear.

My feet pushed more dents into the forgiving sand as I moved up beside him, stared down at the perfect white moon of his face. The thin, blue-veined lids tightened with only the slightest recognition for the start of a new day, but I was fine with that. This could be all mine. I could be the only one to know that even the yellow of the sun, which we found so comforting, fought for its position. It's right.

I sat back down at the shore, cradling my head in my hands while the sun became a huge, round disk, bringing the sky to life.

There was some contentment to be found in solitude.

**A/N:** Sorry…kinda lost it at the end, but it's earlier than I expected! I would LOVE some critique and suggestions for the next chapter


	10. AUTHOR'S NOTE: FINNY AND GENE ARE BACK!

KEEP YOU'RE EYES PEELED FOR THE NEXT CHAPTER CUZ IM NOT THROUGH!!! =)=)=)

~Amber


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